I got sent the research, but I was too busy laughing. If a festival putting on dad-rock and which doesn't have much appeal to younger festival goers is the coolest to younger festival-goers there's something wrong with the research.

As is borne out by Download apparently being the edgiest, too. The people surveyed need to get out more.

I got sent the research, but I was too busy laughing. If a festival putting on dad-rock and which doesn't have much appeal to younger festival goers is the coolest to younger festival-goers there's something wrong with the research.

As is borne out by Download apparently being the edgiest, too. The people surveyed need to get out more.

Boardmasters and boomtown seem to be the most cool and trendy this year from what i’ve seen from people from college ans my old school however I personally think Reading and Download are the best festivals

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I suspect the sample size of IoW millennials was too small to be statistically significant.

I also suspect that the IoW millennials they sampled were people from the IoW, who were bigging up their local thing, and who hadn't been to any other fest for them to give another answer.

Yeah I would say that's accurate as every time I've been at IoW there's hardly any younger festival goers compared to the likes of R&L which I would say out of the big festivals would fit 'coolest' festivals a lot more. Even Glastonbury just because it's Glastonbury, very strange.

Maybe it's a marketing ploy to get more of the younger generation to buy into IoW and go next year, haha.

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I know i am the wrong generation and it is 10 years since i went to IOW so things may have changed, but my main memory was that there was a huge Marks and Spencer food hall there. I know that the days of a festival being part of the counter culture are long gone but M&S sandwiches, come on!

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I think it's pretty cool.... but I'm 55 and have been going to festivals for longer than I care to remember.

You have a choice. Nobody forces you to go.

We stopped going to certain festivals years ago because they shifted their demographic. It didn't suit us.

What do you want from a festival?

Nice weather. Bands and music you know and love. Meeting people and enjoying their company. No arseholes getting pissed and fighting / spoiling the weekend for everyone. Seeing unexpected pleasant surprises on stage - Bastille this year were fantastic. Not our choice, but we were front centre and loved them. And Slow Readers - going to see them next month (Manchester, Albert Hall - great venue). And Alison Moyet.... class... the list goes on.

We don't camp anymore - done it so many times, sunshine, rain, mud.... now we want showers, soft pillows and a full English thank you. A nice walk in to town. A few beers in the Bargeman's.

For us it ticks the boxes. A brill weekend. When it stops being fun, stop.

So yeah - we think it's pretty cool, and long may it continue.

Oh - apart from the skateboard, the cap and the hair (I have none)... that could be me.

I wasn't having a pop at IoW festival, I was having a pop at what is clearly a laughable conclusion from someone's "research". If youngsters really thought the ioW festival as the coolest festival, you'd hear youngsters saying it and you'd see youngsters diving in to snap up a much bigger proportion of IoW tickets than they do.

I don't know what flawed the 'research' without seeing the data, but it's easy to know that it is flawed without seeing the data.

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Perhaps, in front of their peers, 'youngsters' say one thing but actually mean something else.

Perhaps, in front of their peers, they want to appear 'cool' but secretly they really do enjoy the 'laid back, relaxed vibe of the IoW, listening to the music that they've listened to over the years (from their parents, stuck in the back of the car!) and perhaps they really do enjoy it....

Bit like the ad on TV at the moment - the BF - my favourite film is "Fight Club' when his GF reminds him that his fave film is actually 'The Lion King...'

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Perhaps, in front of their peers, 'youngsters' say one thing but actually mean something else.

Perhaps, in front of their peers, they want to appear 'cool' but secretly they really do enjoy the 'laid back, relaxed vibe of the IoW, listening to the music that they've listened to over the years (from their parents, stuck in the back of the car!) and perhaps they really do enjoy it....

Bit like the ad on TV at the moment - the BF - my favourite film is "Fight Club' when his GF reminds him that his fave film is actually 'The Lion King...'

Maybe....

I don't doubt they found millennials who said it was the coolest. People are perfectly free to enjoy whatever they like.

I do doubt that the people sampled by the survey are typical of the age-group and I do doubt that the people sampled by the survey have much festival experience, and I also doubt the sample-size was big.

Essentially I suspect their sample size for IoW was very small, and the people in that sample weren't the most typical millennials but were much of the same mind about IoW.

With proportionally-weighted data (which I know it was), that would skew the result.

If typical millennials found IoW cool, they'd be many more typical millennials going to IoW to enjoy that 'coolness' - and in all fairness to IoW, it's a fair way down the list of the festivals millennials as a whole talk about or attend.

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Indeed - I understand and agree with some of your points - particularly the sample size and spread.

IoW does have, in my very humble opinion, a tremendous spread of attendee ages - and that, again in MVHO, is what makes it such a cool festival.

It's also unique in that it's not the easiest of gigs to get to. We live in the NW so it's a 6h journey, plus a ferry crossing. You really do have to want to be there to make the journey.

To me - that's the difference. It's not an excuse for a weekend piss-up - you could more easily go to V for that...!

It's about the music, the people (young and not so young), the chill - and I think that applies to pretty much most, if not all, of the people who make the journey to be there. We always meet really nice people young and old - on the festival bus, in the pubs, in the queues, in the loos, in the bar, in the tents, front of stage - some we've met time and time again at the gig!

Anyway - off work today so we're off to the cinema to watch Blade Runner... 35 years after the original. And I've got a student discount card... get £1 off the ticket price.

I have seen things you people wouldn't believe... all these things are lost in time, like tears in rain....

Sometimes you just need to enjoy the moment, and don't over analyse!

God, I'm old!

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I haven't been to a festival that doesn't have a wide age range of attendees. At every festival I've been to - from big (Glastonbury) to tiny - less than 400 people - I've seen a range from babes in arms to old farts like me.

As for who is interested in what Millennials consider cool, I would have thought the only people are the PR team for the fests that come close to top of the poll - assuming they want to attract more millennials.

With experience you get to know what festivals suit you. As you get older what you look at a fest for might also change. For example, I now caravan and if I couldn't take my caravan I wouldn't consider the festival. When I was younger that wasn't an issue.

Does the line up matter? What about the toilets? Is it family friendly? Can you take in your own food or booze? All questions different people might ask and may, or may not, think important.

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I think it's pretty cool.... but I'm 55 and have been going to festivals for longer than I care to remember.

You have a choice. Nobody forces you to go.

We stopped going to certain festivals years ago because they shifted their demographic. It didn't suit us.

What do you want from a festival?

Nice weather. Bands and music you know and love. Meeting people and enjoying their company. No arseholes getting pissed and fighting / spoiling the weekend for everyone. Seeing unexpected pleasant surprises on stage - Bastille this year were fantastic. Not our choice, but we were front centre and loved them. And Slow Readers - going to see them next month (Manchester, Albert Hall - great venue). And Alison Moyet.... class... the list goes on.

We don't camp anymore - done it so many times, sunshine, rain, mud.... now we want showers, soft pillows and a full English thank you. A nice walk in to town. A few beers in the Bargeman's.

For us it ticks the boxes. A brill weekend. When it stops being fun, stop.

So yeah - we think it's pretty cool, and long may it continue.

Oh - apart from the skateboard, the cap and the hair (I have none)... that could be me.

That must cost a fortune to find accommodation close by?? I do like the sound of your routine though ha

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We stay about a mile or so outside Newport, in a fantastic gastropub, gorgeous rooms, really nice, friendly, pleasant people run the place, the most delicious breakfasts, cooked to order - all for a lot less than glamping...

Takes about 1/2h to walk in to town. We can get a bus in if we want but we rarely do. Bus home though!

We pop in to Lidl and pick up some lunch - a nice sushi selection perhaps, some fruit, choccie

Then the challenge.... how to smuggle in the gin! Haven't failed yet....!

Someone will either name one of the festivals they've gone to, or the festival they really want to go to but haven't (most likely to be Glasto, I'd guess).

And if the sample size from IoW was small (compared to the sample size of other fests), there's a strong chance they'll have sampled people who worked their response to the "I'm at it so its cool" thing.

Which is what I'm thinking is what happened.

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It’s probably worth bearing in mind that some of these millennials surveyed were 20 when the millennium arrived. Perhaps a lot of the responses were based on nostalgic memories, as opposed to “cool in the last three years”